Sunday, January 07, 2007

Thanks to Willard McCarty at KCL for the pointer via the HUMANIST list. (HUMANIST was the first list I subbed to when I first got online, and it´s been ever the pleasure since, to receive those mailings, even though i haven´t made as much time as i should to read them in recent times. maybe the problem had its source there...) The below is copied twice. The original uses "man", so I went along and substituted all of those instances with "woman" etc, merely to see how the text would read. see comments below.

para varones

>The proper function of a University in national education is tolerably>well understood. At least there is a tolerably general agreement about>what a University is not. It is not a place of professional education.>Universities are not intended to teach the knowledge required to fit men>for some special mode of gaining their livelihood. Their object is not>to make skilful lawyers, or physicians, or engineers, but capable and>cultivated human beings. It is very right that there should be public>facilities for the study of professions. It is well that there should be>Schools of Law, and of Medicine, and it would be welt if there were>schools of engineering, and the industrial arts. The countries which>have such restitutions are greatly the better for them; and there is>something to be said for having them m the same localities, and under>the same general superintendence, as the establishments devoted to>education properly so called. But these things are no part of what every>generation owes to the next, as that on which its civilization and worth>will principally depend. They are needed only by a comparatively few,>who are under the strongest private inducements to acquire them by their>own efforts, and even those few do not require them until after their>education, m the ordinary sense, has been completed. Whether those whose>speciality they are, will learn them as a branch of intelligence or as a>mere trade, and whether, having learnt them, they will make a wise and>conscientious use of them or the reverse, depends less on the manner m>which they are taught their profession, than upon what sort of minds>they bring to it--what kind of intelligence, and of conscience, the>general system of education has developed in them. Men are men before>they are lawyers, or physicians, or merchants, or manufacturers: and if>you make them capable and sensible men, they will make themselves>capable and sensible lawyers or physicians. What professional men should>carry away with them from an University, is not professional knowledge,>but that which should direct the use of their professional knowledge,>and bring the light of general culture to illuminate the technicalities>of a special pursuit. Men may be competent lawyers without general>education, but it depends on general education to make them philosophic>lawyers--who demand, and are capable of apprehending, principles,>instead of merely cramming their memory with details. And so of all>other useful pursuits, mechanical included. Education makes a man a more>intelligent shoemaker, if that be his occupation, but not by teaching>him how to make shoes: it does so by the mental exercise it gives, and>the habits it impresses.

para mujeres

>The proper function of a University in national education is tolerably>well understood. At least there is a tolerably general agreement about>what a University is not. It is not a place of professional education.>Universities are not intended to teach the knowledge required to fit women>for some special mode of gaining their livelihood. Their object is not>to make skilful lawyers, or physicians, or engineers, but capable and>cultivated human beings. It is very right that there should be public>facilities for the study of professions. It is well that there should be>Schools of Law, and of Medicine, and it would be welt if there were>schools of engineering, and the industrial arts. The countries which>have such restitutions are greatly the better for them; and there is>something to be said for having them m the same localities, and under>the same general superintendence, as the establishments devoted to>education properly so called. But these things are no part of what every>generation owes to the next, as that on which its civilization and worth>will principally depend. They are needed only by a comparatively few,>who are under the strongest private inducements to acquire them by their>own efforts, and even those few do not require them until after their>education, m the ordinary sense, has been completed. Whether those whose>speciality they are, will learn them as a branch of intelligence or as a>mere trade, and whether, having learnt them, they will make a wise and>conscientious use of them or the reverse, depends less on the manner m>which they are taught their profession, than upon what sort of minds>they bring to it--what kind of intelligence, and of conscience, the>general system of education has developed in them. Women are women before>they are lawyers, or physicians, or merchants, or manufacturers: and if>you make them capable and sensible women, they will make themselves>capable and sensible lawyers or physicians. What professional women should>carry away with them from an University, is not professional knowledge,>but that which should direct the use of their professional knowledge,>and bring the light of general culture to illuminate the technicalities>of a special pursuit. Women may be competent lawyers without general>education, but it depends on general education to make them philosophic>lawyers--who demand, and are capable of apprehending, principles,>instead of merely cramming their memory with details. And so of all>other useful pursuits, mechanical included. Education makes a woman a more>intelligent shoemaker, if that be her occupation, but not by teaching>her how to make shoes: it does so by the mental exercise it gives, and>the habits it impresses.